7 comments:

Anonymous
said...

I was wondering what you thought about the propositions, specifically prop 77. Personally I think it is a really bad idea for a few reasons. Firstly having judges draw the districts will not take politics and gerrymandering out of district drawing. Furthermore the assumption that any judge can be politically neutral is ridiculous. Additionally, I think dropping the number of people drawing the districts just reduces the chance of an equitable drawing of the districts. I disagree with you on a lot of issues though so I was wondering what you thought.

I support 77. There's a conflict of interest when politicians draw their own districts. In the past, when the state courts have thrown out a redistricting plan, judges had draw a new one.

I agree with you that thinking the politics will be removed is a bit over-extending, but this *is* an improvement, however small, over what we have now. When incumbents from both major parties are against something like this, I say that's a good thing.

Aren't most judges elected in California, and have to be reelected for a new term (like 10 years)?

But retired judges, appointed by a governor--I can see problems with that. Perhaps the only way to get DISinterested people involved is to get a few educated folk from another country, like maybe from Iraq :-), give them the information, and let them draw fairer districts!

People don't realize how good Prop 77 is. In 1973, we had a legislative impasse and the judges drew the state and congressional boundaries which were used until 1981.. They were the best districts we've had in the past 40 years -- they were compact, they fit territories of common interest, and they were simple. In fact, every Senate district consisted of two Assembly districts combined together.

All 10 of the states' largest newspapers -- from the liberal SF Chronicle to the conservative SD Union and the libertarian OC Register -- are in favor of Prop 77. They don't agree on much, but they certainly agree here.